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About CUTS CITEE CART CHD C-SPAC CUTS-ARC Contact CUTS
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(SAP) ABOUT SAP About
SAP
The main objectives of the project are
CUTS for welfare fund for women Consumer Unity & Trust Society (CUTS) has urged the Finance Minister, Pradyuman Singh, to set up a welfare fund on the lines of one established by the Centre. In a pre-Budget memorandum submitted to the Finance Minister, the consumer rights organisation said that such a fund could help women set up enterprises of their own. It also sought a social security scheme for the rural labour class of the State. For the small and marginal farmers, the CUTS sought a crop insurance scheme. It also urged the State Government to utilise the funds already allocated for the resettlement of bonded labourers. The Government had allocated Rs.16 lakh in 1999-2000 and Rs. 2 lakh in 2000-2001 Budget, it said and added that a negligible amount was utilised so far. Panchayat
Budget Analysis- Advocacy tools Ushering
the final phase of the Project titled "Promoting State Accountability &
Citizen's Empowerment" i.e., grassroots advocacy, a training workshop
was organised at Chittorgarh on the 12th Feb 2002.
The aim of the workshop was to build capacities of our networkers,
namely, district and block co-ordinators of the project to understand and
comprehend some of the key findings
of our budget analyses. They were
also trained to disseminate the information through grassroots meetings and
chaupal bhaitaks (Village square meetings). They
were also trained to collect and collate their experiences on issues and send
them to us. This would work
two-ways, one is the formulation of action sheets and the other is to use this
information for policy advocacy. The
networkers were trained to use the analysed information and the experiences of
people in forming small reader friendly documents and questions which could be
raised at the gram sabhas and ward sabhas. The
future programme/s of the project was also discussed, which would primarily
consist of interviewing beneficiaries of various schemes on how they found the
scheme, how they got to know about the schemes, how easy was it to access
benefits and so on. They were
trained to prepare brief questionnaires for the purpose.
The workshop had a good turnout, with all our networkers, some grassroot NGOs not connected with our project directly, and representatives from the district and block level administration actively participating. Preliminary work – Building Base Framing of an action plan for project implementation The project is heading towards the second year now. In the first year, a number of activities were completed. These activities constitute the first few stages of the project. The immediate task was the formation of a project team. The project team was formed with Shri. Bipul Chatterjee, Assistant Director, CUTS heading the team, comprising of a team of management graduates. A core committee comprising of Senior Research staff of CUTS was formed exclusively for the purpose of guiding and assisting the project team. The second step, was to design a micro and a macro plan of the project. To give a micro picture of the process and methodology involved over the period of three years of the project duration, a detailed plan of action in the form of a flow chart and pert chart was developed. The flow chart and pert chart have been the ready reckoner for the entire project team. The charts were prepared in English and in Hindi for the benefit of the field staff. Selection of Nodal Districts and Nodal Blocks The
third step was the identification of Nodal Districts and Blocks for the
implementation of the project. The Nodal Districts and Blocks were
selected on the basis of a number of parameters, namely, administrative
convenience, strength of grass root level networking organisations and
the outreach strength of CUTS on its own. 7 Nodal districts and 64 Nodal
Blocks were selected. The 7 Nodal Districts and the geographic areas
in terms of districts covered under each of the Nodal districts are:
Appointment of Nodal District Coordinators and Block Coordinators For an activity of this nature, the primary requirement is data from various levels of governmental hierarchy. The various levels of government hierarchy starts from the Ministries & Departments located at the State Capital, District Magistrates and District Rural Development Authority at the District levels and the Block Development offices/Panchayat Samithis at the Block levels. Hence, the project team designed the process of data collection in a manner such that, consolidated information could be collected from the state capital, simultaneously from the District and Block levels. This was done, such that, the information so collected could be compared and collated and an in depth analysis to be made, which would present a very clear picture as the funds mobilisation and disbursement for the targeted constituencies. The fourth preliminary step therefore was to appoint coordinators at each of the Nodal Districts, as District Coordinators. The criteria of selection of district coordinators, was on the basis of their strength in terms of networking and presence in each of the various blocks and villages coming under the nodal districts. The coordinators are primarily representatives of social action groups, which are extremely active in these areas, with strong grassroot level presence. The primary responsibility of the District Coordinators was to collect data from the district administration and to coordinate the activities of Block Coordinators. To assist the District Coordinators, Block Coordinators were also appointed in each of the selected blocks. A total of sixty four blocks have been selected for implementation convenience with a Block Coordinator appointed in each of the blocks. The responsibility entrusted with the Block Coordinators is to collect data from the various blocks, identify beneficiaries and to interview some of them, to get more insight into various aspects. Identification of Departments running programmes/schemes for the select target groups Having completed the formalities of identification and appointments of District and Block coordinators, the project team undertook the task of the next phase, i..e., identification of various departments which were and are running programmes for the target groups. The identified departments which are running programmes for the target group - `Women’ are
Similarly,
the departments which are running programmes for the target group of small
and marginal Farmers are
For the benefit of the target group - `Labourers’, programmes are being run by the departments of
Identification of the schemes The team then undertook the task of identification of the schemes which were in operation from the year 1991 till date. A number of schemes were found to have been discontinued and hence, the project team also decided to go into the reasons for having discontinued some of the schemes. It was also found that some of the schemes run by some of the departments were also location specific. One such scheme, which is quite popular in Rajasthan, but is specific to the regions of Banswara, Bhilwara, Dungarpur, and Sirohi is the Tribal Area Development Programme. Another interesting information which the team learnt was that, in the past 3 years, there have been very few takers for the schemes for `Small and Marginal Farmers’, for the sole reason that the definition of `Small and Marginal Farmers’ prevented some farmers, who otherwise fell under the category of `Below the Poverty Line’ to avail of benefits under the scheme. In identification of the schemes, the team realised another difficulty, which was mainly related to the budgetary allocation for the Members of the Legislative Assembly. A sum of Rs. 40.0 lacs has been earmarked to each of the Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) for meaningful expenditure in his/her constituency. While broad parameters are given, keeping in mind the requirement of the district and the block, the MLAs are allowed to spend the allocated money as per their discretion, as long as they are within the given parameters. The team observed that a few programmes were organised under this category, which had a direct bearing on the selected constituency group of study. Keeping this in mind, though, the project team had identified a number of schemes, it was left open to the networkers to add on to the list, if they did find scheme/s which catered to the selected constituencies. The selected schemes were however attached as enclosures to the main questionnaire for the information of the networkers. Design and preparation of an information kit for data collection The next task of the project team was to prepare a detailed information kit and questionnaire. The information kit was designed to be some sort of a ready reckoner for the field team to assist them and also with the view to give a better clarity to what information they sought for and why. The information kit had the following:
Care was taken to ensure that the information kit was continuously updated and improved upon to ensure that there would be no holdups. Training workshops and Seminars for Block and District Coordinators on the Mission, Objectives, methodology and approach of the project A
total of 10 seminars/workshops were organised inclusive of the launch meeting.
Out of these seminars and workshops, 3 of which were state level seminars,
inclusive of the launch meeting, while 7 were organised at the regional
level.
Preparation of detailed inventory of information/data collected The result of some of these preliminary activities was witnessed in the form of a regular information and data flow from the State Department Heads, District bodies and from the Block Development Offices. CUTS
had devised a system where in information would be collected from three
main sources namely,
A detailed inventory of all the information which we have collected and which we seek has been prepared. This is a dynamic document, which keeps getting updated at regular intervals. The inventory is a safety mechanism devised by the project team, in order to mitigate problems related to project staff leaving the organisation. Surveys
conducted at the Block & District Levels
Second
Phase
Opinion
Surveys
Corruption is an evil, which has to be fought on all fronts and at all levels. In India, corruption has unfortunately become very rampant in the last two to three decades. The issue before us today is not merely to catalogue the sorry tales of corruption but also to explore as to how we could tackle corruption. Hence, it was decided to conduct a survey to find out what were peoples perception to corruption and how it affects common man. The survey was extremely successful and threw up a number of interesting information. A total of 80 respondents were surveyed. Some of the interesting highlights of the survey are as follows: Out of the total of 80 respondents, 53% of the people felt that they were facing corruption on a day-to-day basis. A similar percentage of the respondents also felt that without the additional incentive, there was considerable delay in some of the actions taken by some of the various governmental and non-governmental agencies. The positive aspects to it was that majority of the respondents, to the tune of nearly 62% felt that corruption needs to be totally rooted out. The survey on corruption also revealed some interesting statistics on the level of hierarchy of people who are corrupt in government offices. While almost 58% of the respondents felt that officials and workers at all levels were corrupt, 30% of the respondents believed that the senior officials were more corrupt than the junior officials. However, 20% of the respondents believed that the lower class of officials tend to be more corrupt than the senior officials. The survey also tried to make an assessment as to the comparative corruption levels in the private sector. Majority of the respondents believed that corruption was much higher in the government sector than the private sector. They also identified some of the sectors, were the incidence of corruption was the highest. The sectors, which ranked in the top 3 were
The survey also brought out some mature thinking amongst the respondents as to the reasons for corrupt practices and the effects of corrupt practices on the common man in particular and the economy as a whole. To further continue our initiative to confront corruption and inform the common man about the real scenario of corruption, we have decided to document cases of corruption in private and public sector, which has a direct impact on the lives of the common man. The research document would also address issues, as to how to tackle the problem of corruption effectively in order to ensure a corrupt free environment. In addition to this initiative, CUTS has also submitted a memorandum/suggestions to the Chief Minister requesting him to take appropriate actions against officials who were found to possess assets disproportionate to their income levels. The Second Survey The second survey conducted was on `Drought Relief Work’. The survey gave us the information on the drought relief work carried out by government in the drought prone areas of the state. Crores of rupees have been spent or are being spent under the Calamity Relief Fund for drought relief. The idea of the survey was to find out, the real scenario of drought conditions prevailing in the state and what are/were the effects of drought on the lives of farmers. A total of 134 respondents were surveyed, of which 50% were engaged in farming and related activities. A detailed report of the survey and the actions taken thereof by CUTS and its networkers is enclosed as an annexure. Attempt was also made to seek information from the district and block levels, as to the existence of schemes and programmes related to child labour rehabilitation. Survey forms were distributed to the networkers. However, no information has been collected vis-à-vis such programmes. Efforts are on by the CUTS team to find out more about such programmes and schemes, and if any, to assess the effectiveness of such programmes and schemes. Literacy level in Rajasthan is currently at 31.03%, which is one of the lowest in the country. The state government has earmarked Rs. 3,252 Cr for Primary level education, with a sum of Rs. 10. 2 Lacs allocated for the construction of buildings for primary and secondary schools. In order to assess the impact of these investments, CUTS attempted to conduct a survey to assess the level of education and dropout levels in schools. However, information has been collected only from two districts of Jalore and Sawai Madhopur, while it is awaited from other districts. Analysis of CAG report As part of the substantive work, the CUTS team has started with making a detailed analyses of some of the notings in the CAG report which have gone against some of the departments and on certain schemes. The factors which are being looked into are
The analyses are underway, but preliminary results have thrown up some very interesting revelations such as repetition of acts of errors and omissions, unspent amount due to negligence of officers, unspent amount due to wrong definition of terms and usage (which is mainly related to schemes for Small & Marginal Farmers) and expenditure related to foreign tours and travels under the guise of studying how drought relief work is being done in other countries and so on. However, these are just preliminary observations, and efforts are being made to interview some of the officials to get a clearer picture of the whole scenario. This would be part of CUTS initiative during the next phase of the project. Pre-budget memorandum, 2001-02 For the first time in 3 years, CUTS played a major role in Rajasthan to lobby the government to offer certain packages in its budget for the year 2001-02, presented in the Legislative Assembly on the 27th march 2001. A detailed memorandum was presented to the Finance Minister. Suggestions Made To The Finance Minister Some of the suggestions made to the Finance Minister are as follows: Women Empowerment and Girl-child Education: The alternative to free education in the budget should be development of awareness and sensitivity towards education of the girl-child in our society to motivate the head of the family to send the daughter to school. In the process, he will be even willing to pay the expenses. A Women’s Fund, similar to the kind of fund already in existence at the national level, should be established in the state, so that women from the poor and backward classes can start income-generating activities through loans. Consumer Welfare Fund: A Consumer Welfare Fund should be established in the state to make the Consumer Protection Act more effective by providing funds to grassroot consumer organisations. The Fund can also be utilised to assess the functioning of consumer courts and district platforms. Marginal Farmers and Agricultural Labourers: Farmers and landless labourers are facing the brunt of the drought in the state. Agricultural workers constitute 11.54 per cent of the rural workforce. Therefore, to provide social security, some new projects like crop insurance for marginal farmers, provident fund for agricultural labourers and state employees’ insurance schemes should be implemented where both the government and beneficiaries could contribute. Administrative Monitoring and Sensitivity: Stringent laws should be made to prevent misuse of government property. A comprehensive process of investigation should be functional at all levels. A provision should be made to bring transparency about the assets of government officials. Government employees should be given training from time to time to increase their efficiency, improve their way of functioning and sensitise them to the needs of the common man. Social
Audit: Repeated failure of some government projects has prompted people
working for
Formation of Advisory Committee As we are now proceeding towards the second phase of the project, the need for the formation of an Expert Advisory Committee has increasingly been felt. Hence, it has been decided to form an expert advisory committee comprising of Budget analysts, senior retired bureaucrats of the state, Jurists, journalists and academicians. A number of experts have been identified and letters informing them about the formation of the advisory committee and requesting them to join its board have been sent to them. We have received confirmation from some of them, while others have given positive indications, but a firm confirmation is awaited. A tentative list of eminent persons of the advisory committee is as follows:
In addition to the experts committee, a sub committee is also proposed to be formed, which would comprise of among others, some of the serving district administration officials. The advisory committee is expected to be in place by the second week of May 2001. Formation of a consortium of Consumer Organisations to monitor the functioning of consumer forums in the state - `Sushasanay Jan Ayog’. The English translation reads as `People’s Commission for Good Governance’ Yet another activity which CUTS felt needs to be taken up in a big way is to tackle the problems related to the delays in award of justice in consumer courts. It has been felt that the reasons for the delays are due to
Hence, to monitor the activities of the consumer courts and to take up the issue of delay in a big way, it has been proposed to form a consortium of consumer organisations in the state of Rajasthan. The consortium would comprise of grassroot consumer organisations from all the divisions of the state and would comprise of retired bureaucrats, jurists, media persons, academicians, etc. On the 18th March 2001, the consortium was formed and was christened as `Sushasanay Jan Ayog’. On the 4th April 2001, the first meeting of the consortium was held in Jaipur and was attended by the members and experts such as Mr. Mitha Lal Mehta, Former Chief Secretary, Government of Rajasthan & Mr. Mangal Bihari, Former, Finance Secretary, Government of Rajasthan. The meeting worked out an agenda of functioning of the consortium and laid out the basic ground rules of approach. The
consortium will also in due course take up activities related to effective
implementation of the Right to Information Act’.
The core project team currently comprises of Ms. Archana Saxena, who holds a Masters degree in Extension and Communication, Ms. Mamta Tehilramani, Masters in Human Development, Mr. Deepak Saxena, a Lawyer by training and Mr. Dharmendra Chaturvedi who holds a Masters Degree in Business Management. Mr. Srinivas Krishnaswamy, Assistant Director would be overall in charge of the project. This team would operate from Jaipur. Mr. Madan Giri Goswami, Programme Officer, CUTS Centre for Human Development, Chittorgarh would be overseeing the project from our office at Chittorgarh. He is assisted by various volunteers and field officers. Responsibilities of Core Project Team The core team is entrusted with the responsibility Liaisoning and strengthening of a network with District administration officials, assemble project inputs, analyse data and information collected from all sources and writing up of newsletters & fact sheets on a periodic basis. They would also be responsible for organising seminars, workshops and meetings, lobbying with government and writing up of regular reports, inclusive of the final report. The field team comprises of 70 networkers/partners of CUTS who operate out of various districts and blocks. They are entrusted with the responsibility of collecting information and data from the district and blocks, identify beneficiaries and interview some of them, in order to get a clearer picture of how the benefits of various schemes are being passed on to the common man. The field team would also bring to the notice of the project team, any burning issues which needs to be tackled or studied, relating to various issues such as education system socio-economic conditions, level of penetration of famine relief works, existence of corrupt practices and other such issues prevalent in various villages and blocks. PROBLEMS, SOLUTIONS AND OTHER CHANGES In implementing such a project, involving 71 project partners on one side, dependency on the various governmental hierarchy on the other, it is natural that some problems would arise. During the past one year, the following problems were encountered: Data Collection As is stated elsewhere in the report, CUTS team have devised a three tier approach in data collection. The first tier is data collection from the state head quarters, where the contact person/s are various secretaries, Department Heads and Project Directors. The second tier is information from the district levels, where the contact person/s are the District Magistrate, Additional District Magistrate (Development) (He is head of DRDA), Chief Executive Officer, Zilla Parishad and the Chief Medial Health Officer. The third tier is at the Block levels, where the contact person/s are the Block Development Officers, Village Pradhans and Tehsildars. Given this level of hierarchy and elaborate governmental machinery, even if one officer at various levels and departments is a little in giving the relevant information, it would affect the schedule of the project. Further, since the information sought is quite in depth, officials need to spend considerable amount of time with the CUTS field staff. More often than not, CUTS field staff are asked to make many trips to the government offices to collect simple and basic information. Yet another problem related to data collection is with respect to actual determination of schemes for the target groups. As mentioned elsewhere in the report, there are certain schemes which do benefit the target groups, however come under the broad category of say a Below the Poverty Line Schemes. Hence, a clear clarity of what information we really seek is required, to enable that the right information is sought. Since some of the schemes are location specific, for example, the Tribal Area Development Scheme, which is specific to the tribal districts and pockets of Banswara, Bhilwara, Sirohi, Pali etc. general details of such schemes are available only at the district levels. Consolidated information though is available at the headquarters, scheme specific guidelines need to be collected from the districts alone. Hence, these aspects need to be looked into carefully, to avoid omissions. A problem, which is specific to this season, is the issue related to famine and famine relief works. Hence, bulk of the officials is totally pre-occupied with these activities leading to delay in providing information to the staff. Yet another problem is the issue related to constant and frequent transfer of government officials. The CUTS staff have had to face this problem many a times, and sometimes have had to send another official request to the new man in to seek his assistance for information. It is only in the recent past, that there has been some development in the level of computerisation of government records. Hence, information sought for the years 1999 and 2000 has not been a problem to collect, however, information for the years pre-1997-98 has been extremely difficult to get. This fact has been openly acknowledged even by the most efficient of senior officers in the government. However, CUTS staff have been relentlessly following up with all Senior officers, carefully studying various government documents, inclusive of weekly and monthly reports submitted by the project officers to the head office, interviewing various officials to ensure that the above mentioned problems do not affect the project schedule. A ready database of officials is maintained and updated at regular intervals, and sent to all our networkers. A linkage with the Public Relations Officers has been established to ensure that every information related to transfer of officials concerned with our work, is passed onto us forthwith. Another very important task which we have undertaken to ensure that we have information of every scheme and project is to collect the minutes of stock taking meetings which are held religious 4 times a year at every block, where an open meet is organised and details of all the schemes, amount allocation and amount actually disbursed are informed. Reactions and suggestions from the common man are recorded and these minutes are available at various Zilla Parishad offices. CUTS teams are in the process of collecting these minutes from all the districts, some of which has already been done. Partners: A total of 70 partner/ partner organisations are involved in this project. These 70 organisations represent 32 districts. Some of these organisations are primarily grassroot level consumer groups and its representatives may not have thorough grounding on economic issues. Hence, there is sometimes the problem of they not having the clarity as to what they really need to collect and not collect. In a dynamic project such as this, there is sometimes some information which is openly available and could be very valuable, but is ignored. This happens largely due to lack of knowledge of policy related matters. On account of this, it has been found that sometimes, the right kind of data is not being collected. Further, there is also the problem of lack of patience on the part of the partners. In a government establishment, it is quite common that more than one visit sometimes needs to be made to collect even the simplest of information. We have observed that this attitude puts some of our partners off, and so there is a slight degree of hesitation on their part to collect the required information. However, these issues are being overcome with CUTS staff making regular field visits, long telephonic conversations with the networkers and making efforts to visit government offices with the networkers, in an attempt to bolster their confidence. This has worked out positively and increase in the speed of information flow is an ample indicator to that effect. Among the changes in the project management, Bipul Chatterjee has been promoted as Associate Director and hence would not be directly overseeing the project. He would however, be involved in providing overall guidance to the project. Srinivas Krishnaswamy, Assistant Director, would now be directly overseeing the project. The core project team currently comprises of Ms. Archana Saxena, who holds a Masters degree in Extension and Communication, Ms. Mamta Tehilramani, Masters in Human Development, Mr. Deepak Saxena, a Lawyer by training and Mr. Dharmendra Chaturvedi who holds a Masters Degree in Business Management. In
addition to the core team, Mr. S. M. Mathur, Secretary, CUTS, a retired
officer from the Rajasthan Accounts Service, provides valuable advise to
the project team on matters related to data collection and analysis of
data.
Possibly the most crucial year of the project, this phase should see the completion of data and information collection, completion of data analyses and formulation and finalisation of plans of action vis-à-vis the lessons learnt from the analyses. This phase would also see the formulation, finalisation and implementation of plans for information dissemination. More specifically, the project team proposes to ensure that all the information sought for is in place, and the analyses on the basis of information collected would be complete. In addition to this, interviews with beneficiaries on a sample basis would also be done, to get their views on the schemes, levels of corruption if any, time delays, if any and other such details which would throw greater insights into the actual scenario existing in the state. A number of opinion surveys & polls have been designed, which would throw insights into various burning issues, and also enable the project team in designing and developing a document, the ultimate objective of which, would be to educate the masses on the existing scenario, in an attempt to bring them into the governance process and also to sensitise the government machinery on the various issues vis-à-vis the common man. This phase would also see the formulation of the advisory committee, which would advise the project team on analyses, help in designing the agenda for lobbying with the government and information dissemination to the common man. The advisory committee is likely to be in place by the 2nd week of May 2001 and would continue not only for the entire project duration, but also guide the team for activities which would be beyond the project. In furtherance to our work in promoting good governance, in the first phase of the project, CUTS was instrumental in setting up of the consortium of consumer organisations to monitor the functioning of consumer forums. The activities of the consortium would now be done in a big way, with visits to district forums, studies being undertaken to analyse the causes of the delay in handing over justice, some reasons are known, active lobbying to prevent lawyers in the consumer forums and other related issues. The next 4 editions of 5th Estate, English and Hindi versions, 5th Estate Electronic Bulletin, 12 issues of Aap Ke Naam Chitti and 12 issues of Gram Gadar would be brought out during this period. It would also be our endeavour to bring out district wise fact sheets at regular intervals, starting from June 2001. The fact sheets would highlight on the ground realities existing in various districts and blocks. The analyses of CAG reports, Finance Commission Reports and other reports would be published as briefing papers and situation papers in Hindi and English. Efforts would be made to circulate it to every village and Tehsil in the state of Rajasthan. This phase would see a series of workshops and training seminars at various district and block levels, in addition to a national seminar, where the findings of the study would be made public. Details of these workshops and seminars are being worked out, and is likely to be finalised with the advise of the Advisory Committee. Project
related travel would continue, with Srinivas Krishnaswamy visiting other
district and block head quarters. The other members of the team would
also be visiting the field to supervise the interviews and to guide the
field staff.
As per the initial master plan, two periodical newsletter are to be published during the project duration. One, a bilingual and the other an electronic newsletter. Both the newsletters would be published quarterly. Both the newsletters have been titled `The 5th Estate’. In addition to these exclusive newsletters for the project, CUTS also comes out with a wall paper titled `Gram Gadar’ and a monthly newsletter titled `Aap Ke Naam Chitti’. The 5th Estate The purpose of this newsletter is to provide a forum in particular to the civil society, our networking organisations and the masses, to understand the issues related to governance clearly and to promote a healthy, transparent, corrupt free government, where peoples’ rights are protected. The first issue of the newsletters was published in November 2000, while the second issue was published in March 2001. The first newsletter was more on a trial basis and on the feedback received, we have decided to come out with the regular version on a quarterly basis. The 5th Estate would cover issues related to the project, news items on various subjects such as good governance, corruption, gram panchayat, education, government announcements etc. Our networkers are being encouraged to contribute stories and news clippings on various issues related to governance and we have been receiving a fairly good response from them. Some of the experiences faced by the common man vis-à-vis governance, will also be covered in these issues. Gram Gadar (Village Revolution) This is a monthly wall newspaper, which has emerged as a rural communication development initiative. It carried vital information on developmental schemes, legal rights, women’s rights, environmental issues, landmark consumer decisions, women and child health, village upliftment, accountability and governance and other related issues. It has been instrumental in providing a forum for the oppressed classes in getting justice. Its readership cannot be judged merely by the number of copies distributed, which is around 10,000. It actually runs into lacs as even illiterates read the newspaper through the mouths of others’. Aap Ke Naam Chitti (Letter for you) This monthly newsletter highlights activities of organisations networking at grassroots. It carries news related to the consumer movement in Rajasthan. It also draws public attention towards the accountability of the government. All these publications have proved to be very effective in creating mass awareness. In addition to the travel for attending the regional workshops, a number of field visits were made by various members of the project team. In the initial stages, Bipul Chatterjee and Deepak Saxena visited all the 7 nodal districts, namely, Chittorgarh, Jodhpur, Ajmer, Kota, Sawai Madhopur, Nagaur & Jalore. After taking over the reins of the project, Srinivas Krishnaswamy has undertaken a number of visits. He visited the Divisions of Ajmer, Jodhpur & Udaipur and had extensive meetings with the Divisional Commissioner and the District and Additional District Magistrate. He also met a few select Block Development Officers in some of these districts. In addition to the above divisions, he had also a good meeting with the Divisional Commissioner of Jaipur and the Jaipur District and Additional District Magistrate. Srinivas Krishnaswamy also visited the District Headquarters of Chittorgarh, Pali, Jalore, Sirohi, Dungarpur, Banswara, Rajasamand, Bhilwara, Jaisalmer & Barmer. He had successful meetings with the District Magistrate, Additional District Magistrate (Development), Chief Medical Health officer and Chief Executive Officer, Zilla Parishad in each of the mentioned places. Relevant
excerpts of tour reports are being enclosed as annexure.
Bipul Chatterjee attended several workshops on budget analysis, which were organised by The Ford Foundation, in association with the International Budget Project (IBP) of the Centre for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), Washington DC, USA. Learning from these workshops was helpful in preparing the plan of action and implementation of the project. They were shared with the project team, including the networkers, associated with the project. In the first workshop, held in Goa, India in October 1999, Chatterjee was able to interact with a number of people from different organisations who are working on budget analysis for quite some time. The interaction was particularly helpful in understanding issues and how to apply them in relevant contexts. A plan of action for implementing the project, including networking and advocacy strategy, was prepared on the basis of the report of the Goa workshop. In November 1999, Chatterjee participated an international workshop on budget analysis, held in Washington DC, USA. It helped in networking with various international groups working on budget analysis and its different aspects, and the methodology of analysing the impact of budget on different target groups. In particular, the workshop was helpful in understanding the nuances of advocacy, its timing, target group etc and outreach. On the basis of the report of this workshop, the plan of action was revised. In
November 2000, The Ford Foundation, in association with the CBPP organised
an international seminar on ‘budget and poverty’. It was held in Mumbai,
India. Chatterjee participated in the seminar and distributed documents
on project-related activities. The event was particularly helpful in understanding
the linkages between budget and approaches in analysing poverty and related
issues. He discussed the implementation of the project with several key
personnel and sought their help and advice on some critical issues. The
same is being used in implementing the project.
The first of the training programmes was the Launch Meeting, held on the 7th May 2000 at Jaipur. The meeting was attended by a number of networkers. The meeting was primarily organised to
The launch meeting was structured in a manner in which, a thorough backgrounder was given to the networkers on economic policies, governance, rights of citizens and the need for transparency in governance. A detailed strategy of approach was also discussed at length, highlighting the methodology of approach and the expected outcome of the project. On the basis of the discussions and the interactions, the basic outline of the information kit was designed. The launch meeting also discussed the various deliverables of the project and the time frame. The
second of the training programme was State Level Seminar, organised on
the 5th June 2000 at Jaipur. The meeting was attended by all the
7 district co-ordinators and 64 block co-ordinators. Notable
resource persons who attended the training seminar included, Shri. Mitha
Lal Mehta, Former Chief Secretary, Rajasthan, Ms. Kavita Srivastava, Convenor,
National Campaign for Right to Information and Mr. Laxmi Narayan Verma
from CECOEDECON.
The third state level seminar was organised at Masooda, Ajmer district, on the 11-12 November 2000. The state level seminar was basically to take stock of the progress of the project and was some sort of de-brief session for all our project networkers.
The project team felt that regional training workshops need to be organised. This was primarily to ensure the following:
Keeping this objective in mind, 7 regional level workshops were held at the following places.
The workshops was designed as an interactive session, with actual mock interviews and role plays being organised for the benefit and understanding of the field staff. All the participants found the workshop immensely helpful and the result of this was in the form of better and constant flow of information from the field. Workshop on good governance on the occasion of World Consumer Rights Day, 2001 In addition to the above described training workshops and seminars, it was decided to devote an entire half day session to take stock of the progress vis-à-vis the project, on the occasion of the World Consumer Rights Day Celebration, 17th March 2001 at Jaipur. The seminar was attended by all the 7 district co-ordinators and 64 block co-ordinators. The half day session was devoted to exchange of ideas and information between and amongst the project team. Various experiences were exchanged and certain actions, which would need to be taken, were also discussed. Meeting of the Chief Minister, Ministers, Department Heads and Division, District & Block Administration officials for project briefing To
acquaint the government machinery about the project, the project members
have had a number of meetings with the chief Minister, The Finance Minister,
Secretaries of various Departments, Department and Project Heads and Divisional,
District and Block level administrators. Most of the meetings were
very successful, with the government recognising the need for undertaking
such kind of study. A detailed note of the various meetings and outcome
thereof is given in the annexure. The meetings with the Division and District
level officials was primarily to request them to provide the required information
to the CUTS staff on various programmes/schemes.
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